We’ve all had to wait for something. The clerk scans the groceries tediously slowly; our line at the drive-thru sits motionless while the ones on either side zip along; the delivery that is scheduled from ten to two arrives at five-thirty.
It is worse when we’ve got too much to do, we’re running late, and the light turns red just ahead of us. We grit our teeth, because waiting is wasting our time.
Yes, that’s right. We’ve waited, and our time has been wasted. We’ve only got so many hours allotted to us each day, and to fritter them away waiting on other people grinds at every nerve in our bodies.
Does God waste our time? Is he slow in fulfilling his promises? Or, and we hope and pray this is true, does he have a plan that we just don’t understand?
Let’s look at three truths the Word gives us about God’s timing.
Truth #1: Not even the angels know when God plans to return for his own.
God does not see time as we see it. We look at today, an hour from now, three minutes left, the next thirty seconds. We get impatient when the microwave takes longer than 15 seconds to heat a donut. Oh, but we live in the fast lane! Our time is limited, and we see it slipping through our grasp, like the tide flowing out across a sandy beach. There’s nothing to do except watch it disappear.
God sees it differently. After all, he has forever. He can plan in eons, and he sees the centuries as mere blips against the grand scheme of eternity. When we ask of him, we expect it now. When he answers us, now reverberates to the tick of God’s clock, not ours.
Matthew 24:36 reveals the truth we must accept. No one knows when God is returning for his church, save God alone. Not even Jesus or the angels know. Only the supreme clockmaker can set the alarm.
Truth #2: We must be prepared to endure trouble while we wait.
For centuries religious zealots have looked at events across the globe and decided that now must surely be the time when God will come back for his own. John Wesley expected him in 1836. William Miller? March 21, 1844. After a slight recalculation, the Millerites changed that date to October 22, 1844. The Catholic Apostolic Church was convinced it would be 1901. The Jehovah’s Witnesses laid claim to 1975.
The Bible tells of horrific End Time events that will foretell Christ’s second coming. 2 Timothy 3:1-5 reassures us the last days will be filled with difficulty. However, if anyone should deny God’s supreme right to decide when he returns, we are to avoid them, for theirs is the appearance of godliness without the substance thereof.
The troubles we endure do not predict the second coming of the Lord. He is the one who decides.
Truth #3: We must always remain ready for his triumphant return.
Jesus told his disciples that some of them would not taste death before he would return. Yet, one hundred generations have passed since the death of the Savior. At times we feel weariness in our well-doing, and it’s easy to think we have the rest of our days to carry out the grand commission. We can volunteer to work in the church nursery next week. Next summer is when we’ll sign up to cut the church lawn. We’ll start back to Sunday school when the kids are grown. We have time to rededicate our lives back to Christ after we retire.
Jesus says otherwise. In Matthew 24:44 he tells us that we must always be ready, because we can’t begin to guess when he will return.
When we feel our Christian walk has come to a standstill, we may find ourselves waiting on God, but we needn’t feel that God is wasting our time. There is always work we can do for him in the kingdom.
God never wastes our time. He provides us a door of opportunity to do something grand for him. It is up to us to step through.
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